Nyuk nyuk nyuk. It was one of those Three Stooges kind of brewing sessions today as I finally made good on my half of the message board Great Wit Invitational. I just racked the wit and a second beer from today's brews off their trub and tucked them into the fridga-fermenterator.

The events of the day:

This was the first step mash on a converted keg system I have been using for a year. The mash/lauter tun is foam-insulated and so it doesn't take direct heat. We had a cold (for October in Florida) morning and my hot liquor additions after protein rest left me 5F shy of conversion temperature. Had to pull a gallon and a half from the mash and decoct to get the mash up to temp.

Things only got, er..., more interesting from there. Even using flakes and a half-pound of rice hulls, the 6 lbs of unmalted wheat in the grain bill stuck the mash good. I thought I could blow it out, but the inlet under the false bottom was so gunked up that air I thought was blowing the pipe clear was actually pushing out the hoseclamped ends of the inlet tube. I eventually dumped the whole mash into a 48 qt. cooler to blow the line clear with a hose. I never had to do that before, but I never had a grain bill with @50% unmalted wheat before either.

Uneventful rest of the brew day (no, wait... I did slag a nice long-handled plastic brew spoon I set down too close to my cooker whilst dealing with the concrete mash).

In hindsight, I know exactly why I ran into snags today. I ticked off the homebrew gods because I had run out and had neary a drop of homebrew in the house. So I could not R.D.W.H.A.H.B during today's session as everyone knows should be done. I had to settle for commercial offerings (good commercial offerings - James Page IPA from OZ). apparently that did not sit well with the household gods. And all because I was out of town last weekend and had to put off a scheduled brew day until this week. Lesson learned

There is an off-center scientific journal called "The Journal of Irreproducible, Results" where researchers can get a marginal publication out of something that went woefully wrong or had improper controls, etc. I'm afraid that's where the protocol and outcome from the last batch would wind up

Actually, the decoction seems not to have darkened the beer noticeably, which was my primary concern with something as light as the wit. And, Snyder notes in the BM Bible that single- and double-decoctions are the trad method for the style. So in time I'm sure I will fondly recall this session as brewing strictly to historic style, and the not the seat-of-the-pants brew day it was.

My only other concern is the yeast strain I used. Wyeast has both a Belgian White (3944) and a Belgian Wheat (3942). My plan was to go with the tart, slight phenolic profile in the 3944, but my shop sent me the 3942 instead (Their contrasting profiles sound comparable to the two White Lab strains - W52 and A35). Rather than put off brewing yet again I figured I'd go with it. My concern is getting something a little more estery than I was shooting for, but I still have high hopes for this one.

I also got to finally brew this weekend and also brewed a wit, since someone got me in the mood for it with a ton of posts. I used rice hulls for the first time and I am very happy with the outcome. My sparge went effortlessly, sorry about yours, and all is well with it cooking away in the bucket. I had to put a blowoff in cuz it was going so strong at first. I used the WLP400, which is the belgian wit from white labs. All seems well and I should get a little taste in a day or two when I re-rack. On another note, I also got my apple cider yesterday and have started that fermenting towards some apple wine. So its sitting right next to the peach and the pear wines that are ahead of it. The blueberry is already in the bottle(yummy).
Later, Ed

Sorry, that topic line is phonetic potty humor from a syndicated radio show ("what sophisticated woman doesn't enjoy a big Dickens Cider?...").

Ahem... Actually it's interesting (downright spooky, even) that the cider thread has come up because I am planning to do my first cider as the companion brew to the dark beer I have been contemplating for the next brew day. My plan for the "A" brew was either a smoked porter or a dry stout - it's been more than a year since I have brewed either style. I'm hesitant to take the plunge on an Imperial with you because of the maturation time involved. Not only am I very impatient in the home stretch of a brew, I also have to do my conditioning in the lone all-purpose fridga-fermenterator-keg-serverator (my Florida house ambient temp hovers around 80F). That means no serving temps while something as majestic as an Imperial comes into its own.

(I keep telling the Mrs. we need another 'other fridge' but she insists on making credit card and mortgage payments - no sense of priorities).

Anyhoo, the worry-free feeling that doing a good old-fashioned extract brew alongside the wit got me thinking about a having a sparkling cider on hand for the holidays. My plan (based largely on the Higgens et al. Homebrewers Recipe Guide - mostly extract brews but great creativity and an inspired chapter on cooking with beer) is to dose 5 gallons of fresh cider with pectinase (maybe some minimal spicing), and after a day or so pitch 2x champaigne yeast for a nice dry finish. No boil, no mash, and I can serve up some holiday snakebites (or apple black velvets if I do do the Irish stout).

On a somewhat (ok, barely) related note... Have you seen the Replicator piece on Midas' Touch Ale in the new BYO? pale malt, honey, and white muscat concentrate used in imitation of a barley beer/mead/wine concoction discovered in the ca. 800 B.C. actual tomb of the actual King Midas? And I hear the guy started out with one little muffler shop in upstate Illinois. Go figure...

i put the berries in a food processor and made a puree, then put it in a fine mesh bag. put the water and other stuff in your bucket and stir well, then add your bag of berries. wait 1 day before adding the yeast. this is due to the fact that the campden tablet will kill any nasty bacteria, and you must wait the day or it will also kill the yeast. i usually leave it in the bucket for about 2 weeks, open it every couple of days and move the stuff around, lift the bag out and let the sugars drain out.
re rack to a carboy and wait for it to clear out. you may want to rerack every 3 weeks or so. i bottle after 2 1/2 to 3 months, or when its clear enough for you. sg should end below 1.0000

i got my recipe book at my HB store, its a small purple booklet with over 100 recipes in it, so you can make wine out of anything. onion wine anybody???letr me know if you have any other questions
ed